Ingestible electronic devices could monitor physiological conditions or deliver drugs.
Researchers at MIT and Brigham and Women’s Hospital have designed and demonstrated a small voltaic cell that is sustained by the acidic fluids in the stomach. The system can generate enough power to run small sensors or drug delivery devices that can reside in the gastrointestinal tract for extended periods of time.
This type of power could offer a safer and lower-cost alternative to the traditional batteries now used to power such devices, the researchers say.
“We need to come up with ways to power these ingestible systems for a long time,” says Giovanni Traverso, a research affiliate at the Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research. “We see the GI tract as providing a really unique opportunity to house new systems for drug delivery and sensing, and fundamental to these systems is how they are powered.”
Traverso, who is also a gastroenterologist and biomedical engineer at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, is one of the senior authors of the study. The others are Robert Langer, the David H. Koch Institute Professor at MIT; and Anantha Chandrakasan, head of MIT’s Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science and the Vannevar Bush Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. MIT postdoc Phillip Nadeau is the lead author of the paper, which appears in the Feb. 6 issue of Nature Biomedical Engineering.
Sustained by acid
Traverso and Langer have previously built and tested many ingestible devices that can be used to sense physiological conditions such as temperature, heart rate, and breathing rate, or to deliver drugs to treat diseases such as malaria.
“This work could lead to a new generation of electronic ingestible pills that could someday enable novel ways of monitoring patient health and/or treating disease,” Langer says.
These devices are usually powered by small batteries, but conventional batteries self-discharge over time and pose a possible safety risk. To overcome those disadvantages, Langer and Traverso worked with Nadeau and Chandrakasan, who specialize in developing low-power electronics.
The research team took inspiration from a very simple type of voltaic cell known as a lemon battery, which consists of two electrodes — often a galvanized nail and a copper penny — stuck in a lemon. The citric acid in the lemon carries a small electric current between the two electrodes.
To replicate that strategy, the researchers attached zinc and copper electrodes to the surface of their ingestible sensor. The zinc emits ions into the acid in the stomach to power the voltaic circuit, generating enough energy to power a commercial temperature sensor and a 900-megahertz transmitter.
In tests in pigs, the devices took an average of six days to travel through the digestive tract. While in the stomach, the voltaic cell produced enough energy to power a temperature sensor and to wirelessly transmit the data to a base station located 2 meters away, with a signal sent every 12 seconds.
Once the device moved into the small intestine, which is less acidic than the stomach, the cell generated only about 1/100 of what it produced in the stomach. “But there’s still power there, which you could harvest over a longer period of time and use to transmit less frequent packets of information,” Traverso says.
“This paper reports an exciting and remarkably broad collection of advances in ‘ingestible’ electronics — from bioresorbable power supplies to energy efficient electronics, advanced sensors/actuators, and wireless communication systems,” says John Rogers, a professor of materials science and engineering at Northwestern University, who was not involved in the research. “These types of systems have great potential to address important clinical needs.”
Miniaturization
The current prototype of the device is a cylinder about 40 millimeters long and 12 millimeters in diameter, but the researchers anticipate that they could make the capsule about one-third that size by building a customized integrated circuit that would carry the energy harvester, transmitter, and a small microprocessor.
“A big challenge in implantable medical devices involves managing energy generation, conversion, storage, and utilization. This work allows us to envision new medical devices where the body itself contributes to energy generation enabling a fully self-sustaining system,” Chandrakasan says.
Once the researchers miniaturize the device, they anticipate adding other types of sensors and developing it for applications such as long-term monitoring of vital signs.
“You could have a self-powered pill that would monitor your vital signs from inside for a couple of weeks, and you don’t even have to think about it. It just sits there making measurements and transmitting them to your phone,” Nadeau says.
Such devices could also be used for drug delivery. In this study, the researchers demonstrated that they could use the power generated by the voltaic cell to release drugs encapsulated by a gold film. This could be useful for situations in which doctors need to try out different dosages of a drug, such as medication for controlling blood pressure.
Learn more: Engineers harness stomach acid to power tiny sensors
[osd_subscribe categories=’ingestible-sensors’ placeholder=’Email Address’ button_text=’Subscribe Now for any new posts on the topic “INGESTIBLE SENSORS”‘]
Receive an email update when we add a new INGESTIBLE SENSORS article.
The Latest on: Ingestible sensors
[google_news title=”” keyword=”ingestible sensors” num_posts=”10″ blurb_length=”0″ show_thumb=”left”]
via Google News
The Latest on: Ingestible sensors
- How do fingerprint sensors work?on April 24, 2024 at 5:00 pm
Despite our best efforts, locks are susceptible to picking and passwords to hacking. So, how should we protect our stuff? The answer might lie in biometrics. Once a feature of Sci-fi cinema ...
- Sensors Bolster Army Prowesson April 24, 2024 at 5:00 pm
The Terrain Commander from Textron Corporation provides the basis for the U.S. Army's unattended ground sensor (UGS) Future Combat Systems. The sensor assembly is equipped with a variety of optical, ...
- Army Looks Forward on Forward-Looking Infrared Sensorson April 22, 2024 at 4:59 pm
As the U.S. Army produces third-generation forward-looking infrared (FLIR) sensors, officials are exploring emerging capabilities that might be integrated into fourth-generation systems. FLIR ...
- Internet of Things in Healthcare Market to Surge to USD 471.20 Billion by 2031: Industry Analysis, Technologies and Competitorson April 22, 2024 at 8:48 am
Internet of Things in Healthcare Market to Surge to USD 47120 Billion by 2031 Industry Analysis Technologies and Competitors ...
- Everything You’ve Wanted to Know About Ingestible Collagenon April 21, 2024 at 5:00 pm
The beauty industry is no stranger to trends, and ingestible collagen is no exception. From gummies to smoothies, and of course, the celeb-approved wellness drink of choice, bone broth ...
- Bioadhesive for sticking sensors on squishy squidon April 18, 2024 at 5:00 pm
The lives of most sea creatures remain largely mysterious. Bound to boats or land, researchers rely on sensors to collect data and piece together how marine animals move through their environments.
- Plant sensors could act as an early warning system for farmerson April 16, 2024 at 5:01 pm
Using a pair of sensors made from carbon nanotubes, researchers from MIT and the Singapore-MIT Alliance for Research and Technology (SMART) have discovered signals that reveal when plans are ...
- 10 Things to Know About How Glass-Break Sensors Work to Protect Your Homeon April 11, 2024 at 8:54 am
Q: I’m looking to install a home security system, and the kit I’m looking at includes optional glass-break sensors. But how do glass-break sensors work, and are they different from motion sensors?
- Aqara’s best presence sensor just got even betteron April 8, 2024 at 5:00 pm
That’s where presence sensors come in, and there are few more impressive than the Aqara FP2. This presence sensor has been an impressive piece of kit ever since it was released, but just ...
via Bing News